Anxieties: Sleeping and Waking [and also Duckie]

In this morning's anxiety dream, I was an hour late to pick up my father at the airport, because I had to drop someone else off first and that had taken a lot longer that I'd planned. Somehow the fact that my father was waiting at the airport was very, very bad. I glanced at my cell phone, and saw that I had three missed calls. When the phone rang again, I expected it to be him, but instead it was an irate woman from Saudi Arabia. She informed that I was supposed to be arriving in Saudi Arabia that day, and why hadn't I left yet, and you know visas and arrangements for American academics were very complicated, and if I wasn't going to show up then I would cause a lot of trouble. I remember thinking how I never wanted to go to Saudi Arabia, but I could take care of everything just as soon as I got to the airport. At that moment I looked over and realized I was in the passenger seat and no one was driving the car, even though it was moving very fast. As the car careened off the road and began to flip over, I woke up.

Ho-hum... Could my anxiety dreams be any more obvious? Oh well. In my waking life, I attempted to get a debit card from my bank today. As I believe I explained in these pages several months ago, in this country a check book and a debit card are considered extra-special privileges—the account I have allows me to get cash out of an ATM and nothing else. How this is more convenient that putting my money under my mattress remains an open question. So anyway, when I opened this ersatz "account" I was told—nay, encouraged—to apply for an upgrade after I'd been at my current address for six months. As of June 5, it had been exactly six months since the move-in, so I duly made an appointment, showed up five minutes early, sat around for twenty-five minutes waiting for them call my name, and then had a meeting lasting approximately two minutes in which the woman (who appeared to be, in Kim's enduring phrase, "from the Isle of Officious") told me that there was no way they could upgrade my account. Guess why! Guess why! Well, I'll tell you: I do not deserve a debit card because there is not enough money coming in to my account. Well, sure! Why else!

If this makes sense to anyone, please explain. I was warned before I came here that it might not be worth my time trying to get a UK bank account, but I didn't believe it. But at this point, I really can't think of any way that having this damn account has done me any good whatsoever. I pay for everything in cash anyway, and any money I might have saved from the foreign ATM charges my US bank would charge me are more than eaten up by the ridiculously exorbitant wire transfer fees that I've incurred in order to move money from the UK to the US to pay my US bills. So my advice to anyone coming to the UK—just don't open a bank account. As a special added bonus, you won't have to deal with the absolute worst customer service I have ever experienced in any private business in any country ever. We're talkin' DMV-level service here.

I had to buy myself a tie at T.K. Max afterwards just to make myself feel better. It's Famous Labels Month at TK Max, kids! Liberty ties for eight quid!

The big news of the weekend was Duckie, a club in South London that is London's near-analogue of Trannyshack. I had been told that I had to go to Duckie even before I'd arrived in London, but had never gone because the journey home from South London on a night bus would be just that little bit more torturous. That alone kept me away for this long. In any case, it was a really great night. I went with R— (who needs a better pseudonym, since there are too many R—'s: this is the prematurely-shacking-up one, not the traveling-to-Brazil one). R— is rapidly becoming one of my most treasured friends here; he's a total sweetheart, and sharp, and fun.

I shall have to go several more times before I can evaluate with any authority how Duckie and Trannyshack actually differ. Some obvious things: The website declares that Duckie receives funding from the Nation Arts Council, and I think this is not a joke. The ol' Shack is, um, not taxpayer-supported (although I would so love to read that grant proposal). Also, Duckie is hosted by a zaftig lesbian from New Jersey in a big Shirley Temple dress and Alberta Straub glasses. Trannyshack is...not. The crowd at Duckie is slightly older than I expected, although just as hip and rowdy. Differences in the audience probably have a lot to do with its being on Saturday night at 10:30, rather than Tuesday at midnight.

The biggest difference was that there were only two acts, and this seemed more or less normal. I believe the shortest T-Shack show I ever saw had at least 5 or 6. The first number was a live song about the death of River Phoenix, sung to the tune of "American Pie." ("Bye, bye, you vegetarian guy / Took a speedball at the Viper, on the pavement you died..." etc.) Witty! The second number was a girl in a chef's outfit who lip-synched while stripping off her clothes and throwing desserts on herself. The climax came when, after exposing her breasts, she dumped a huge bowl of trifle over her head. The resonance with things that go on at Trannyshack is fairly obvious here—I'm specifically reminded of that mud-drenched "Dirt Baby" number from circus sideshow night about a year ago. It also relates to some unseemly goings-on at The Teacher's Pet's former employer.

Oh and the music was fantastic. Old stuff, weird stuff, new stuff, and Kate Bush.

Finally, one more thing for the "Greg hates being a foreigner" file: I was talking to an English acquaintance, and explaining how I'll sometimes go without rather than risk saying the wrong name for something. He asked for an example, and I said, "Well, I take my shirts in to get cleaned (an extravagance, I know, but it feels so good). In the US, they always ask you if you want starch, and if so, how much—but here they never ask. If I could, I'd like some light starch on my shirts, but this is exactly the sort of thing that would have a different name, so I'm too embarrassed to bring it up." My interlocutor was dismissive of my anxiety. He said that it's just called starch, and that I should just ask for it. Emboldened, when I took my shirts in today I said "I'd like starch please!" And then...the blank stare from hell. He looked at me as if even asking him for this non-existent substance was somehow personally inconveniencing or insulting him. "Y'know, it makes the shirts a little bit... stiff?" "You mean, ironing?" he suggested. "No. Forget it."

This was immediately before the debacle at the bank. Moral: never ask anyone for anything ever. Anything besides simply accepting what you've been explicitly offered will only end in heartbreak.